


You're not from around here, are you?

by StarsHideYourFires



Series: What If... [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Case Fic, Gen, Gunslingers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-18
Updated: 2011-11-18
Packaged: 2017-10-26 05:52:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/279450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarsHideYourFires/pseuds/StarsHideYourFires
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which John Watson is a former army doctor trying his luck out west, and Sherlock Holmes wanders into his dusty, Colorado town.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You're not from around here, are you?

**1878 - River’s Edge, Colorado**

The tall, dark haired stranger rides into town on a Friday evening, his black hat pulled low over his brow to shield his eyes from the glaring sun, and chalky, grey dust coats the bottom of his long coat. Few people notice his arrival as the small town has little to offer travelers, and very nearly less to offer the townsfolk. In fact, only one person observes as he dismounts and hitches his horse to one of the posts outside the saloon, and Doc Watson, while intrigued, knows better than to approach the strange folk who pass through River’s Edge. Still, he watches as the stranger strides into the saloon, only to hear a gunshot ring out moments later.

This should not surprise him; most of the town’s residents are either cowboys waiting for the next cattle drive or men with dark pasts who went west to hide from them. Those are the kind of men that tend to accumulate enemies, and he has seen plenty of them get shot over petty squabbles. As he ponders this he hears a shrill scream and another three shots, prompting him to run from the barber’s where he has been waiting for a shave. He runs first into the saloon, only to see panicked looks on the faces of the few young men playing cards and that of the barman. Doc Watson pauses, attempting to catch his breath, and runs to the back entrance, finding himself directly behind the dark stranger who has knelt down beside what looks like a body; his hand had just gone into the pocket of his coat.

Watson pulls his revolver from his holster and holds it level on the man’s back. “Stand and turn,” he says, his voice calm and authoritative, “Real slow.” The man looks back over his shoulder and does as ordered when he spots the pistol trained upon him at so close a range. He keeps his hands at his sides which makes Watson nervous. “Who are you?” he asks, “And why’d you come here?”

“I heard the gunshots,” the man answers, “And the screaming. No one else looked to be investigating, so I figured I’d check it out.” He ran an appraising gaze over the man who could very easily shoot him, and after a moment his expression snaps to one of understanding. “So you aren’t a lawman, but you were military, that’s what threw me… You aren’t from here.”

“Nobody’s from here,” Watson says, confusion and frustration heavy in his tone. Keeping his pistol pointed at the stranger, he reaches up to swipe a tanned hand along his brow, under the brim of his black bowler. “This town hasn’t been here long enough for anyone to be from here. Barker only just got his ranch started five years ago,” he adds.

“Well, obviously,” the man says, “This town practically smells new, the timber is clearly rather fresh. No, I meant you aren’t a man of the frontier, and you aren’t a permanent resident of this particular town.”

“Well, no, but not many are,” Watson says, now more confused than ever.

“You’re a doctor, and you travel rather extensively between several of the towns in the area, don’t you? And you must have been very young when you served in Mr. Lincoln’s army.” Watson’s head is swimming as he watches the man look down at what he knows are bodies, of at least one man and one woman, judging by the trousered legs he can see and the scream he heard only minutes earlier. “Now, Doctor, I can assure you that I don’t know anyone in this town, but we’ve got a murderer on the loose. Where is your sheriff?”

“Don’t got one,” Watson answers. “Anything bad enough happens we have to call in the rangers, but usually, Mr. Barker handles the minor disputes. He has all the money so he has the power.” The shorter man shrugs as he looks up at the stranger who still hasn’t revealed his name. “And right now I’m fixin’ to take you to see Mr. Barker, since you’re still standing over those bodies.”

“Doctor,” he says coolly, “I can promise that I didn’t shoot them, you can go ask the barkeep and he’ll tell you I was in there until after the last shot was fired, so I’d prefer if you’d lower your Peacemaker.” Watson does, allowing the barrel to tilt toward the ground until he can relax his arms enough to return the six-shooter to his holster. “The name’s Holmes,” he says as he reaches his right hand forward.

“Watson,” the doctor says as he shakes Holmes’s hand, eying the pistol that hangs at his thigh below his duster, revealed as the fabric rises with the wearer’s arm. The he steps forward and past the strange man who has somehow figured out his basic life story just from looking at him, too preoccupied with the recently gunned down people in front of him.

The man on the ground is Billy Evans, little more than a boy really, and one of Barker’s cattle hands. A good man, a man without enemies. The previous winter Doc Watson had been called when Billy took a bad tumble and broke his wrist. Now Billy lay dead before him, a dark red blossom directly above his heart and a black, wet patch in the dust beneath him. His eyes are still open. Beside him is a woman, and the doctor only knows her as Sarabeth, one of the girls who works at the saloon at night; Billy had been sweet on her if talk around town was to be believed. Watson figures the current situation proves it. She has two bullet holes in her chest, one high, near her bare clavicle, and one low, just above her last rib. The third bullet must have missed, likely buried in a wall now.

The doctor looks over his shoulder at Holmes, and sees that the man is looking just as intently at the bodies. “I should take them to the barber, he’s got a surgery in the back, closest I can get to a proper morgue here,” Watson says.

“I’m sorry, Doctor, but you and I have more pressing matters,” Holmes answers. He then runs back inside the saloon and returns with the card players, friends of Billy’s. He tells them what to do with the bodies and then sends them on their way. Jack Tate—Watson dug a bullet out of his shoulder two summers ago—has tears in his eyes as he lifts Billy’s legs. Watson watches the young men take away the bodies, and he feels a wave of nausea wash over him; for the briefest moments he sees a body strewn field and he can smell the burning black powder, smoke billowing on the—

“Doctor,” Holmes almost barks in order to get the other man’s attention. “You said Barker was the man to see if anything happened in town, I say we go and see him then.”

“Alright. Yes,” Watson agrees. Together they walk around the saloon, back to the main street and Holmes retrieves his grey from the hitching post while Watson, not having time to fetch his own horse, takes Billy Evans’s mustang from its post down the street.

Watson rides hard and fast to keep up with the strange man, barely managing to keep his mind focused on the task at hand as he wonders where Holmes came from and what business he could possibly have in a cattle town like River’s Edge.

When Barker’s ranch comes into view, Watson sees that word has already reached the cattle men; ten ranch hands are posted at the gate, firearms at the ready.

“Mr. Holmes,” Watson asks, “What exactly are you planning on telling Barker?”

“That one of his men has been murdered, along with a young woman, and that something needs to be done about it.” The answer is cool, calm, and very straightforward, as if he is following a strict and familiar procedure. Not sure how to continue, Watson remains silent until they reach the gate, where he uses his familiarity with the men in order to get them onto the property.

And then Holmes does exactly what he said he would, telling the grey-haired cattleman about the murder he and Watson very nearly witnessed and saying something must be done.

“That’s all very well and good, Mr. Holmes, was it?” Barker says, “But there’s no sheriff in this town, and I’m keeping the rest of my men here for their own protection. So I don’t know what exactly it is that you want me to do.” He tilts his chin up with the imperious air of a man who knows he can buy every man in the room and stares down the stranger who has come with the only decent doctor for miles.

Holmes gives Barker a smile that is little more than the slightest twinge of his lips before saying, “I’m sorry, but I heard you were the man with the most authority in these parts and I guess I wasn’t clear. I’m offering my services.”

“What?” Barker asks.

“I’ll find this murderer, Mr. Barker,” Holmes says, “And I’ll do it fast.”

At this Barker laughs, “You want to go and play at lawman, son, I ain’t gonna stop you. Hell, make it official, you can be sheriff for all I care, but don’t expect any extra help from me or my men.”

Holmes simply narrows his gaze and says, “Wasn’t planning on it; I only require the services of the good doctor, as he will be able to complete a far better medical examination than I could of the victims.” Then he pinches the brim of his hat as he nods, adding, “Please continue with your hiding,” and he turns, striding away from the grizzled cattle man as his duster flaps around his gangly legs. As he reaches the door he calls, “Come along, Doctor,” over his shoulder. Watson gives his own fleeting nod to Barker before catching up with his mysterious new companion.

Upon returning to the main bit of River’s Edge, the two men go straight to the barber’s back room surgery and the doctor sets about a simple examination of the bodies. Cause of death is obvious as he looks over Sarabeth, but he notices an unexpected wound on the back of Billy’s head, looking like he had been clubbed with the butt of a pistol. When he points it out to Holmes the man’s eyes light up as he leans in to take a closer look.

“Would you say this blow could have killed him?” he asks, fixing his pale eyes on the doctor.

“It is entirely possible,” Watson answers, “At the very least it would have knocked him out, but the shot to the chest was likely just a means of ensuring he was dead.” He turns away as he packs up his medical bag, returned to him by the barber, and clears his throat. “Will that be all, Mr. Holmes?”

“You know the people of this town. I was hoping you could help me with the remainder of the investigation. You’ll be far better at gaining their trust than I could on my own,” Holmes says.

“I don’t know how true that is,” Watson says, a hint of weariness in his tone as he returns his bowler to his head. “Folks here let me treat them, but they don’t talk to me much beyond that. There isn’t much trust in a place like this.”

Holmes huffs a little as he shifts himself over a few feet, putting himself between Watson and the door. “But you still know the people here, can tell me a bit about them that I may not notice on my own.”

Watson raises an eyebrow at this and tenses his hand around the handle of his bag. “I highly doubt, Mr. Holmes, that there is much of anything you can’t figure out about a person. I don’t know how you did, but you got everything important about me within five minutes of seeing me,” he says.

“It’s easy enough to read your military background in your stance and your belt buckle; your weapon alerted me to fact that you remained with the army at least another nine years which means something else entirely, but I’d wager you did so in order to finish your medical training with the surgeon you worked under, and then it was a career you could live on. I extrapolated your medical training from the fact that you ran toward the shots, ready to respond quickly the way you would have on the battlefield. Your accent and the fact that it’s unlikely a town as small as this has a permanent doctor told me the rest.” Holmes says all this with such exasperation dripping from the words that Watson feels as though he is being scolded for forgetting his times tables.

The two men look at each other for a moment before Holmes adds, “And I still feel you will be a great deal of help to me on this investigation, if only because you knew the victims and I did not.”

“But how is that going to catch the killer? Understanding motivations only goes so far, Holmes.”

The taller man smiles, “Yes, but that’s the interesting part. I can already tell you the shooter was a man of above average height and that he will be very easy to find since the girl managed to shoot him, likely in the shoulder.” He then pulls a Remington derringer out of his pocket and hands the small pistol to the astonished doctor.

“Don’t you think this is something you should have mentioned earlier?” Watson asked as he intently studies the weapon, noting that both its barrels are empty. “But, she should only have been able to fire one shot,” he says, confusion clouding his features.

“She may have fired at the same time as her killer; the sound change wouldn’t be different enough for you to notice if the timing were right. Or she only had one barrel loaded.” Holmes crosses closer to Watson before brushing past him to look down into Billy Evans’s face. “And I didn’t mention it because you had a gun on me and I didn’t want to startle you. Then I had a plan I needed to work through. And you know now…” He shrugs and moves toward the door.

“So we’re honestly looking for a tall man who’s been shot? Where was the blood then?” Watson crosses his arms over his chest as he follows behind Holmes to the exit.

“He must have held his hand over the wound as he ran off since there was no extra blood on the ground, but there’s a smear of it on the side of the saloon.”

Watson frowns. “Don’t you think someone may have seen a man who’s been shot and said something?”

“He’s either lying low, rode out after we did, or has an accomplice, which I doubt,” Holmes says as they exit the building and make their way around to the street. Then his tone shifts as he continues, “After we catch our man, Doctor, I have a proposition for you.” Watson just raises his brows in response. “My reasons for coming out west are not my own, I owed a very particular man a very particular favor. I won’t go into the details now, but a man with your expertise would be very useful in carrying out this favor.” Holmes let the silence settle over them again, giving Watson space to think about his proposal.

Then as he paused in front of the saloon, “So are you up for it, Doctor Watson? Would you like to see a little more danger?” he asked, a sly smile hiding at the corner of his lips.

Without missing a beat Watson gave his answer. “Yes.”


End file.
